I've been looking at other hosts such as ramnode, but i'm not quite sure what kind of package I need for my forums, and what I should use to configure the vps. I've rented a test server in the past to try out centminmod and that worked relatively well.

For what your getting that is more or less the going rate. There are some cheaper hosts that will get you a bit more of one thing or another for a bit less but...

You don't need 3 gigs of ram for xenforo at that size. Unless your running something else too I'd drop that down. If your running mysql 5.6 then disable performance schema which will drop memory usage by 10 fold. Its possible to run nginx, php 5.6 and mysql 5.6 in 512 mb of ram and handle 50 to 250 users simultaneously (as in not just casually viewing over the 15 minutes users online shows). Even properly tuned 1gb is safer.

Having 2 threads is nice but using an opcache will bring the CPU load down. Still best to stick with 2 if you can afford it. Never know when you might need to do server side maintainence that will bog it down.

Hey guys, i'm currently renting a vps from aso (a small orange), and thinking about moving as I feel that I pay too much for what I receive.
I've been looking at other hosts such as ramnode, but i'm not quite sure what kind of package I need for my forums, and what I should use to configure the vps. I've rented a test server in the past to try out centminmod and that worked relatively well.

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If you are wanting pure SSD, then I'd look at the

Code:

2048MB SKVM 2048 MB 4 Cores 1 IPv4 IPv6/64 42 GB 4000 GB $28 / month

one. If you are not as concerned with SSD's for the drives then you may want to look at

Code:

2048MB CKVM 2048 MB 4 Cores 1 IPv4 IPv6/64 110 GB 4000 GB $28 / month

These are KVM nodes. Don't even screw with the OpenVZ ones.
At one time WebHostingTalk had coupons for them in the forums. I don't know if they still do that (had heard they didn't). I know the last time I got one to use, my 30% off coupon was still being honored on my account... which had not been active in over a year.

one. If you are not as concerned with SSD's for the drives then you may want to look at

Code:

2048MB CKVM 2048 MB 4 Cores 1 IPv4 IPv6/64 110 GB 4000 GB $28 / month

These are KVM nodes. Don't even screw with the OpenVZ ones.
At one time WebHostingTalk had coupons for them in the forums. I don't know if they still do that (had heard they didn't). I know the last time I got one to use, my 30% off coupon was still being honored on my account... which had not been active in over a year.

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The first one is what I was lookign at as well, seems like a rather good deal. Would you say that centminmod is a good way to set up the vps? I don't plan on using it for anything besides xenforo.

The first one is what I was lookign at as well, seems like a rather good deal. Would you say that centminmod is a good way to set up the vps? I don't plan on using it for anything besides xenforo.

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Six of one, half a dozen of another. It really depends which distribution you are comfortable with. The majority of my VPS's (I have my own server I create them on) are Debian, but I do have a few CentOS that I set up for the exposure. I am still more comfortable with Debian (been a while since I really used anything RH based). I do like centOS with CentMin Mod from @eva2000. It took me a little getting used to and I still prefer the install routine of Debian - but with CentMin the stack is installed and pretty much configured for you - unlike Debian. It (CentMin) is also a little more "customized" in the compilation of nginx than Debian's repo is - but that's because you compile it on the system, unlike with Debian.

This is an incredibly easy question to answer. What's your current resource usage? That's the first thing to figure out, and then go from there. You should know exactly what your resource usage is now, and go with a matching VPS.

This is an incredibly easy question to answer. What's your current resource usage? That's the first thing to figure out, and then go from there. You should know exactly what your resource usage is now, and go with a matching VPS.

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This.....

Too many people give the amount of members or posts without talking about the main issue - actual traffic in terms of page loads and data!

Some forums - for example those on football - might see 20X as much traffic for a couple hours during and after a game, and very little at other times.

Each is different - so your server has to be set up for about double the capacity of your busiest times (IMHO)....if you want a little room to move and grow. Also, IMHO, going up in scale doesn't add as much capacity as you often think since bottlenecks will appears somewhere along the line. That is, don't assume if a 2GB server handles 10,000 page views per day that a 4GB will handle 20,000 (example only). It may if perfectly tuned, but that's rare also...most systems are not optimized.